Saturday, September 11, 2010

Luis - The Ex-Terrorist

The months of July and August were full of God proving to us again and again that He is a God of miracles and that He is capable of things that we would deem impossible. I have many stories of this but in this blog I would love to share one in particular of a man named Luis Torrejon. We have known Luis for quite awhile now. His wife became a Christian in the first weeks that Dalila and her original partner were working in Belen, and her and their 6 children faithfully assist our services. Luis was initially pretty hostile towards us. The hostility changed to indifference. He told us that we could visit and what his wife wanted to do was her decision, but he really didn’t believe any of the things that we would tell him about God. We learned that Luis is an ex-terrorist. And as he himself told us more than once, he has done things that “we could never imagine”. Many times when we went to their house we would find Luis drunk. He eventually changed to the point that he would hold regular, friendly, conversations with us when we would visit. He even took some of the discipleship classes that we were offering. I think that for Luis it was difficult for him to imagine that anyone could ever actually forgive him for all that he has done in his life. That, with God’s help, he could change and have a new life.

Our boss, Brian, came to visit our group in Iquitos a couple of weeks ago. He came with us to see some of our work in Belen and we decided to go visit Luis. Our hope was that maybe it would help if it were another man who was talking to Luis. The entire time that Brian and Luis were talking I sat praying. Luis couldn’t seem to sit still, he kept getting up and walking around, or fidgeting. It was really apparent that he was struggling with the things that God was speaking through Brian. That there was a true war going on in his mind. He told us how he has no peace in his life. That he can’t rest, that he can’t sleep, because of the memories of so many different things in his past. He also has many bad experiences with another pastor that is in the area. Finally he sat still and truly thought about the things Brian was telling him. And we watched as his face completely changed and he said that yes, he wanted to accept Christ. As Brian and Luis prayed I could so strongly feel the Holy Spirit in this little house. God truly did the impossible in changing Luis’s life that day. He now has started coming to church with his family, and every time we visit we can see the change, the difference in his life. He has a craving to learn and he has talked more than once about how he wants to be a pastor someday.

 Brian and Luis

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